This summer is different.
I just came in from walking the dogs. The morning was cool. As we walked, I could feel the hot air in little pockets. It didn’t seem to mix with the cool air and it wasn’t like the cool air was warming. It was two kinds of air, battling for supremacy in the meadow as I walked. This is new. Before, air would warm with the sun. Now, these mornings, the sun seems to be a spectator to this hot air muscling its way into these spaces that used to be for us. By noon, the sun will be an enthusiastic teammate, heating the air to new records.
The Grandview fire is out, the Bootleg fire is burning within its designated fire lines, but there are new ones north and south of here and yesterday August begun. Fire season is traditionally late August through September. This summer, we are (understandably) restricted from even using our own charcoal grill in our own backyard. This is new.
Polar Bears could disappear by 2100 due to melting ice according to a Toronto-based study.
The world is changing. I’m not going to preach about it, because we are the dupes. We are the marks. We have been lied to and sold a bill of goods. The perpetrators are the earth’s governments and those who profit from the continued sale of oil. Both could have taken steps to prevent this 40 years ago and any time in those 40 years. For 40 years, oil companies and governments knew what the continued use of fossil fuels were doing to this planet’s atmosphere but did nothing. Less than nothing, the oil companies lied and lied, and made us think that scientists somehow had something to gain from merely telling us the truth. We can sip out of stainless steel straws and drive our hybrid cars all we want (and we should do both and more), but we cannot move the needle. The big polluters have the controls.
Do I have another idea? No. I only have a sense of helplessness, although I continue to look around for a ray of hope. Here’s some information from our government about current energy use and its resulting emissions: https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/energy-and-the-environment/where-greenhouse-gases-come-from.php
I will continue to drive my plug-in hybrid and try to buy things from ethical companies, but I sure wish oil companies had been ethical, and people in power had tried to protect us. We are the polar bears now.